


The Old Routine

by obstinate_as_an_allegory



Series: Other Ways Home [3]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-15
Updated: 2015-11-15
Packaged: 2018-05-01 20:04:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,151
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5219042
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/obstinate_as_an_allegory/pseuds/obstinate_as_an_allegory
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sirius returns to Hogwarts after an eventful summer, and gets a detention with a difference.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Old Routine

At King’s Cross, Sirius knows he shouldn’t be looking for Regulus, but his eyes won’t stop scanning the crowds; he’s hardly looking where he’s going. As the crowd shifts he sees a combination of Slytherin colours and neat black hair and almost wrenches his neck trying to look. Remus is basically steering him along the platform with a hand on his arm.

They picked up Pete on the way over, and heard a lively account of his holiday that lasted them almost the whole way to the station; as they haul their trunks out into the concourse he eventually draws breath and asks ‘What about you lot? Anything interesting happen?’

The three of them share a look, and James puts an arm around Pete’s shoulders and tugs him off down the train. James’ explanation of events is likely to be partial and overexcited, but fuck it, Sirius doesn’t want to explain it himself, and everyone will have heard about it soon enough, it’s not the sort of thing you can keep quiet in a fucking boarding school.

 Sirius is too busy scanning the platform again to notice when Lily Evans approaches. Pete firmly nudges James out of her path and all but pushes him onto the train, and she ignores him rather ostentatiously, flicking her hair back over her shoulder as she makes for Remus.

‘Hi Remus. Good summer? The prefect compartment’s up front. Alright, Black.’ She gives him a sideways look and then hesitates for a moment as if she notices something different about him and decides not to comment on it.

‘Evans,’ he says, smirking, or at least, trying to. ‘Broken any hearts this summer?’

‘Shut up.’

‘I can’t make the prefect meeting, Lily,’ Remus says firmly, giving Sirius a poke in the ribs. ‘Do you mind telling me the details later?’

Lily casts a suspicious look from one to the other and then clearly decides again not to pursue it. ‘Fine, but you owe me,’ she says, and breezes off.

‘You don’t have to babysit me,’ Sirius says, as soon as she’s out of earshot. ‘I’m not going to run off and pick a fight with –‘

‘I don’t want to go to the prefects’ meeting,’ Remus says flatly. Sirius doesn’t believe him, but his objection dries up on his tongue when he’s distracted by a glimpse of a green scarf. He looks around, but it turns out to be Nott, who notices Sirius looking at him and sneers nastily, reaching for something in his robes. Sirius’ fingers close around the wand in his jeans pocket. 

Things got pretty bad last year; their relationship with the Slytherins has always been antagonistic, but it got to a point where violence was always simmering under the surface, liable to break out any time everyone realised there was no teacher in earshot.

 There’s no reason to hope things will be any better this year. The Death Eater thing is getting real momentum up, now.

There’s a head of black hair a bit further along the platform, it looks like -

Remus tugs him hard on the arm. ‘Come on. Let’s catch the others.’

Sirius nods reluctantly, jaw tight.

‘Was that Evans?’ James demands, as soon as they step into the compartment. ‘Did she say – she probably didn’t say anything about – well, but – what’d she say?’

‘Said she’s made a terrible mistake and actually skinny speccy nerds _are_ her type, who knew?’ Sirius tells him.

 ‘Fuck you. Moony – did she –‘

 ‘I can neither confirm nor deny anything Lily may or may not have said,’ Remus says gravely, shoving his backpack onto the luggage rack.

Sirius wedges himself into a corner of the compartment, stretching his legs out along the seat. Pete is staring at him in a kind of horrified awe and Sirius wishes he would stop. Remus –strategically, he’s sure - puts himself between Sirius and the window, so he can’t really keep scanning the crowds for signs of Regulus.

 

-/-/

 

In the thronged entrance hall, he hears harsh laughter and his shoulders jolt; he’s trying not to be so fucking twitchy but he knows that voice. 

‘Black! Hey, Black, is it true your mother threw you out of the house?’

‘Cissy and I have had a bet on when it would happen for years,’ Bella’s voice puts in, a lazy drawl. ‘I expected it _years_ ago.’

‘I heard he ran away. Couldn’t hack it; tail between his legs. Knows there’s no room for blood traitors in…’

 ‘Ran away from his own mum, sobbing and crying. Not so tough as you make out, eh Black?’

He rolls his shoulders, casts a glance at McGonagall surveying the crowd with her lips pinched tight, and says nothing.

It only took the length of the train journey for the news to be all around the school, because even if Regulus wasn’t the one who told them – Sirius hopes desperately that he wasn’t, but isn’t fool enough to actually doubt it. Regulus chose his side, and Sirius chose his. They have no loyalty left for one another – even if Regulus didn’t tell the story, his mother will have regaled Bella and Cissy with it thoroughly by now, and the Malfoys will have heard it when they inevitably came for dinner, and Rosier and Lestrange and MacNabb will have heard it from them. If everyone in the damned castle doesn’t know by the end of dinner, it’ll be a miracle.

The hall hums with tension, and Dumbledore’s welcome speech is unusually solemn. One end of the Slytherin table keeps whispering through it, and later one of the newly Sorted Hufflepuffs gets hit with a nasty stinging jinx, fired under the table.

Someone shoves Sirius hard as he mounts the stairs, and he spins, edgy, wand already in his hand.

‘Twitchy, Black?’ 

Sirius has his wand in Avery’s jeering face before anyone can stop him, adrenaline firing through him. Someone – Remus – is calling his name and trying to jostle his way over.

 ‘Don’t call him Black,’ calls another voice, loud enough to carry. ‘I’m not sharing a surname with scum like that.’

‘Fuck off, Narcissa,’ James snaps, because Sirius is shaking too hard to tell her himself.

‘You know your mother burned you off the family tree?’ Cissy adds, smirking at Sirius. ‘You’re nothing now, as far as anyone who matters is concerned. Might as well be a Mudblood.’

 Sirius spins and fires a hex straight into her face, she shrieks as boils break out right across her nose. As he’s distracted, Avery sends a curse at him that grazes his ribs, and James, somewhere behind him, bellows ‘ _Expelliarmus!’_ A few younger students scream and try to scramble out of the way, but before a full-blown battle can kick off, McGonagall has sprung up out of nowhere.

 She sends Narcissa to the hospital wing and Avery to his dormitory, served with detention, and expertly disperses the goggling first years. Remus is obliged to leave them, shepherding a rabble of tiny eleven year olds and looking anxiously over his shoulder at James and Sirius – even for them, it might be a record to get detention within three hours of arriving for the term. McGonagall turns to them at last and sighs as if she really doesn’t know what atrocity she committed in a previous life to get landed with _them_.

James blurts, ‘They started it, Professor –‘ but cuts himself off abruptly when he meets her eye.

‘I am fully aware of who started it, Mr Potter. Mr Black, come with me, please. Potter, go to your common room.’

‘Professor – it was-‘

 ‘Now, thank you.’

Sirius shrugs at him, and James traipses off up the stairs. Mournfully, he follows McGonagall down the corridor to her office – this, at least, is familiar; he knows his role in this set-up, has been here many times before. She ushers him inside, and he hovers sullenly by her bookshelves, unwilling to sit down until she makes him. She points her wand at the kettle over the fire and makes it hiss, and turns to pour tea before she acknowledges him. She’s holding _two_ cups of tea. Maybe this is a perk of sixth year; detention actually comes with catering. 

‘Have a seat, Black.’ She rounds the desk and sits across from him, placing both cups down amidst the parchments and ledgers covering its surface, and finally meets his eye, frowning, but not at full-gage icy fury, so Sirius is hopeful.

‘Mr Black, I owe you an apology.’

 Sirius blinks, casts a panicky look over his shoulder, and blurts ‘I just hexed my cousin in the face.’

‘Yes, my memory of the incident remains intact,’ she says dryly.

He knows he should make an insolent remark. It’s what they’re both expecting, and the way these little meetings usually go; the format of his interviews with McGonagall is sacred. He just can’t quite think of anything –

‘As your Head of House, it is my responsibility to keep an eye on your wellbeing,’ she says sternly, cutting off his fruitless scramble for a cheeky comeback. He nods, a little awkwardly. ‘I have let you down – Sirius.’

 He freezes – as much from the use of his first name as from the actual words, though they are startling enough on their own. He gapes at her.

 ‘I – what?’ 

‘You must be aware that Mrs Potter wrote to the school about what happened during the summer.’

 ‘Er – yeah.’

She’d asked him if it was alright, explaining that if his parents tried to get him  back – they won’t, it would mean admitting that they ever _wanted_ such a son in the first place – they would need Dumbledore and McGonagall’s support, and Sirius had agreed to it in a vague, mumbling way; at the time it had seemed like a good way to get out of the conversation.

‘And I understand that this was not the first instance of – disagreements, between you and your family,’ McGonagall adds. She’s frowning again – not her usual frown, though, and he doesn’t like this one.

‘Professor – I – um, I mean. It’s not like it was your fault.’

 ‘I take my responsibilities to my students seriously, Mr Black.’

 He nods, hurriedly. ‘Yeah but. I never said.’

 She glares at him over the top of her spectacles. Eventually, feeling foolish, he adds, ‘Um. Sorry.’

 She sips her tea thoughtfully, and nods at his side. ‘Did that curse hit you, Black?’

 He pats at his robes – a little singed, his ribs feel tender but not really hurt. ‘Not really. Dunno what it was.’

 ‘Something rather nasty,’ she says.

 ‘I – well. It’ll be bad, this year, Professor,’ he blurts on a sudden instinct, and the stern glare is back in an instant. He hesitates, because fuck sake what’s the world coming to, Sirius Black _warning_ a teacher about impending chaos. Still, though… ‘He’s started swearing people in. The, you know – “Dark Lord.”’

 ‘Lord Voldemort,’ she corrects him.

 He nods distractedly. ‘Is he even a real lord?’ he wonders aloud, and she gives him a glare much more like her usual one for a split second; it makes him want to be impudent again.

 ‘Swearing people in?’ she prompts.

 ‘I don’t know – don’t know much,’ he says hastily, looking down at his hands. ‘They’ve got this tat, on the arm. Skull thing. It’s – they’ll go after the Muggle borns.’

 After a moment, she says softly, ‘Who will?’

 His mouth twists. For a moment, he thinks about it… but decides not to. There are some lines…

 ‘Can’t say.’

 It’s a moment before he looks up, but then he manages to hold her gaze for several seconds, and at last she breaks off with a slight nod. ‘All right, Black. Thank you. You’re free to go.’

 He gets up quickly, hoping she won’t remember Narcissa’s hexed nose and change her mind. He’s got a hand on the door handle when she calls his name. ‘Black?’

 He tries not to sigh. Turning, he bats his eyelashes, because one day that’ll start to work on her. ‘Professor?’

 ‘Mrs Potter was concerned – about the nature of the confrontation with your family this summer. You are aware of the law, concerning the use of - particular curses?’

 He didn’t know James’ Mum had told them that. He tries to muffle a shiver, leaning against the door frame. ‘Ye-es,’ he says.

 ‘Is there anything you want to tell me?’ she says, frowning at him again, in that uncomfortable way, like something pains her on a very personal level.

 He shakes his head firmly. ‘No, Professor.’

 ‘If you are concerned –‘

 ‘There’s nothing, Professor.’

 She gives him that look again, and he doesn’t squirm. ‘Very well. Run along then.’

 He shoots her a grin. She raises a weary eyebrow.

 ‘And - Black? It has been rather a long day. If you and Mr Potter could put your usual nonsense on hold until Tuesday I’d be much obliged.’

‘No promises, Professor,’ he says, smiling in relief.


End file.
